Tuning In: Ron Darling, John Smoltz predict long road back for Red Sox

Thursday

Oct 4, 2012 at 6:00 AM

Bill Doyle Tuning In

TBS baseball analysts Ron Darling and John Smoltz aren't very confident that the Red Sox will make the playoffs next season, no matter who manages the team. But Darling doesn't expect Bobby Valentine to return in the job.

“I think it's going to be tough for Bobby,” Darling said yesterday.

CBSsports.com reported later in the day that the Red Sox will fire Valentine as early as today after the Sox finished last in the AL East in his only season in Boston.

Darling pitched for the Mets, but grew up in Millbury and graduated from St. John's High, so he knows Red Sox history and still feels such a connection with Massachusetts that he referred to the T&G as his hometown newspaper during a conference call with the media.

Smoltz is also familiar with the Red Sox because he pitched for them in 2009 after spending his first 21 seasons in Atlanta. He blamed the team's woes this year on the front office.

“They need continuity,” Smoltz said, “within the organization from general manager on up to the ownership. You can't have confusion after a year that was so devastating and there was so much behind-the-scenes destruction. It never had a chance to settle down for Bobby.

“Do I think he makes it (back)? Well, the only reason he would make it is because the team had so many injuries and certainly did not have an opportunity to put the baseball team on the field that they had hoped for. If he doesn't make it, it will be because of the atmosphere and the attention given to a lot of things that were said in and out of the clubhouse (that) will become the undoing, fair or not.”

Ernie Johnson, who will provide play-by-play of the ALCS on TBS alongside Darling and Smoltz, believes Valentine was his own worst enemy. Whereas Johnson credited former Atlanta Braves manager Bobby Cox with always backing Smoltz and the rest of his players, he doesn't feel Valentine did the same.

“Early on in the Bobby Valentine regime,” Johnson said, “the clubhouse got splintered right away and it's very hard to put a cohesive unit and effort on the field every night when that kind of stuff is going on. I don't know if Bobby will be back or will not be back, but you can't splinter the clubhouse and go after guys who are the foundation and the backbone of that team, and I think it really had a drastic effect on that team.”

Whoever manages the Red Sox next year will face a difficult challenge of trying to reach the postseason for the first time since 2009.

“They're going to have to improve a lot of their team,” Darling said.

Improving might not be enough in the powerful AL East.

“I think the most difficult part that they have to face,” Darling said, “is not only what they do within their own ballclub, but Baltimore (is) legit. Tampa Bay, not even in the playoffs, (is) legit. Yankees (are) always legit. … Again, just a very difficult division. It's going to be a lot of work for (GM) Ben Cherington and his staff this winter.”

“In baseball,” Smoltz said, “many teams have proven how you can make a one-year adjustment. To say they can get back, there's no doubt they can get back, (but) they need a lot of factors going their way.”

In addition to the Red Sox' poor record, there's another reason Valentine probably will be fired — to boost the ratings on Sox-owned NESN. Even though the team ranked fifth in baseball by attracting 6.43 percent of local households, its ratings on NESN plummeted 18.4 percent this year, according to USA Today.

TBS will televise both wild-card games tomorrow night and up to 18 games in the division series and ALCS. MLB Network will televise two division series games and Fox will carry the NLCS and the World Series.

The pick of Smoltz and Darling to win the American League championship might surprise you — it's Detroit. The Tigers own the worst record of any team in the AL playoffs, but they peaked at the right time, and the pitching of Justin Verlander and the hitting of Miguel Cabrera and Prince Fielder make them tough to beat.

“Verlander is the surest thing in baseball,” Darling insisted.

Smoltz and Darling both picked Cabrera as their AL MVP. Smoltz selected St. Louis catcher Yadier Molina as his NL MVP, and Darling went with Giants catcher Buster Posey.

Tomorrow night's one-and-done wild-card games will be tense.

“For every manager,” Smoltz said, “it's their worst nightmare. Nobody really wants to manage this type of game because there's going to be so much second-guessing and so many opportunities to question strategy that in a best-of-five series you don't do as much.”